


How Bucky Tried to Avoid Tony (and failed)

by JennerJen



Series: Underneath Your Clothes [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky has issues, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Tony Has Issues, sneaky bucky
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-20
Updated: 2015-08-20
Packaged: 2018-04-16 08:31:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4618587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JennerJen/pseuds/JennerJen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky has moved into Avengers tower and is struggling with trying to find himself. He finds Tony Stark. Not that he wants to mind you. He has enough issues and he doesn’t need to drag anyone down with him, thank you very much. But the thing about Tony is, give him a problem, and he’ll try and fix it. Hide, and he’ll find you. STOP HIDING SHIT BARNES.<br/>Prequel to Underneath You Clothes</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Bucky Tried to Avoid Tony (and failed)

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! I just want to start off by saying how blown away people are with my stories so far. Thank you everyone for the kudos, comments, bookmarks and subscriptions!  
> Like stated in the summary, this is the beginning of Underneath Your Clothes. How Bucky came to the Tower and settled in, and how he started his crush on Tony and then tried oh so hard to ignore it.  
> Enjoy. xo

It was late, and Tony had been in the workshop for the last 28 hours. He wasn’t exactly AVOIDING the newest addition to the tower, but really Cap? Ex-crazy (ok brainwashed, not technically his fault) assassin guy having free reign in his home? This made it on the ‘Not OK’ list. 

As he stepped out onto the communal floor to grab a snack, he noticed the TV had been left on. Again. “Fucking Barton.” Tony sighed. He changed course for the living room, only to come up short when he noticed Barnes on the couch. 

He was curled up on his left side, metal arm wrapped around his waist, right hand clenched in a fist under his jaw, and he was shivering. Tony leaned closer, noticed tear tracks, Barnes’ lips moving inaudibly and realized he wasn’t shivering so much as trembling from a nightmare. Or, with his history, probably something very real that had happened to him that he was currently reliving. 

‘Guy probably has a lot of bad memories stored up in that mess of a mind,’ Tony thought to himself. He sighed heavily and reached out to nudge him awake. Besides a quick, “Mi casa es su casa, apparently” when they were introduced the week before, the two hadn’t been in the same room since. 

Just before Tony’s hand made contact with Barnes’ shoulder, his wrist was clamped in an extremely painful grip by the metal hand. A hiss of pain escaped Tony, and then Barnes’ eyes flew open as he jackknifed into a sitting position. Eyes were wide and unseeing, heavy pants of breath were being forced out, and an increased tightening on Tony’s wrist had him re-thinking that whole ‘trying to be a nice guy’ thing and ‘this is how I die.’

“Barnes,” Tony began because, hey self-preservation. “It’s Stark. You’re in my tower, you’re safe. You were having a bad dream and I’d really appreciate it if you could not detach my hand from my arm, I need it for science stuff. Also, jerking off. And no offence, I don’t really wanna be cyborg twins with you.” 

Tony was staying still in case any movement was perceived as a threat, but internally he was freaking out. ‘Note to self, do not attempt to wake up crazy ex-Hydra agents that suffer from PTSD from horrible nightmares if you want to live.’

James “Bucky” Barnes. Tony had a hard time connecting the guy Howard would talk about with the mess of a man that had been dumped into his life. When Howard would regale his young son about the good ol’ days with Captain to-good-to-be-true America and his motley crew, Tony had always been drawn to Sergeant Barnes. He had tried to impress his father by becoming a Captain fan-boy when he was younger, but once he hit pre-teens, hidden behind the old time propaganda poster of the Captain punching Hitler were several photos he’d managed to steal of Barnes. Those got him through some lonely nights. Hey, for a dead guy (well, not-so-dead guy) he was hot, and there was the added bonus that he had punched Howard in the face that one time. He was young adult Tony’s hero and wank fantasy. And he was currently grinding Tony’s wrist bones to dust. 

“Sergeant, let.GO!” Tony snapped, the pain overriding common senses. Barnes took in a sharp breath and blinked. The fog was gone from his eyes and they trailed down to where his hand was encircling Tony’s wrist. Like he’d been burned, he snatched his hand away. 

Tony sighed in relief and used his other hand to rub circulation back into his numb arm. Shaking it out a few times, he felt no lasting damage except for the bruises already starting to form. He glanced over to Barnes and noticed how pale he was. The bags under his eyes were much more pronounced now, and his lips were drawn into a tight grimace. 

“So, don’t get used to this,” Tony tried for nonchalance, but from the way Barnes’ shoulders slumped, he figured he missed the mark. “But I’m about to do something I don’t often do.” Here Barnes gave a large gulp, and Tony realized he was bracing himself for bad news. “I’m going to admit I made a mistake.” And suddenly Tony was staring into wide shocked eyes and it looked like Barnes wanted to interrupt, so Tony talked over him, he was good at that. 

“I should’ve known better than to try and shake you awake, honestly, I’m pretty disappointed in myself and I deserved a punch in the face, not with the metal arm though because this face? Classic. I need my looks you know?” An exaggerated wink and he continued on pretending not to notice the tension creeping out of the lines of Barnes’ face. “I know I’ve done my fair share of damage to people when they get too close when I wasn’t expecting it, so I can only imagine I set off a whole barrel of unpleasantness for you. So this is me. Apologizing. And admitting I was wrong. You get a two-fer. Not a lot of people get one of those things outta me and here you are getting both at the same time, you should feel special Barnes.” Tony rocked back on his heels and used his newly released hand to scratch at his face, trying to play off being unaffected, while his heart was still pounding behind the Arc reactor. 

“We good?” Tony cocked his head to the side and looked down at Barnes without trying to appear he was actually looking down ON him. Since he delivered the apology, Barnes’ jaw had snapped shut, wide eyes locked Tony, mostly confused, but there was something on the look of his face…and Tony was too tired for this shit. 

“Sarge?” he tried getting his attention again by sticking his hand out. The warmth that embraced his hand distracted him enough he almost missed the low voice mumble, “We’re good." 

Barnes let go, and got up swiftly. He ducked his head, used his loose hair to cover the red of his face and fled the room. 'Poor guy’s probably flustered I caught him vulnerable and ohmygod.. I just had a moment with Bucky Barnes.’  
Standing alone in the living room, Tony was unaware that that was the moment James Buchanan Barnes fell a little bit in 'like’ with the genius billionaire playboy philanthropist.  
….  
"At least I didn’t get punched in the face like Howard.”

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think. Drop a kudo or comment, or come visit me on Tumblr at lilragekitten. <3 Thanks for reading.


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